Many people probably remember the video that was submitted from The Hub directly to Equestria Daily a long time ago in the era of the late spring of 2011. A few fans of this video set out to create a website dedicated to the video, nothing complex but a simple pink site that featured the 30 second version of the song on a loop, with a timer showing how long you’ve been on that page.

It seems within the last few days the owners of the site were contacted by Hasbro Legal with a Cease & Desist order, demanding that the website be removed. The legal letter that was received by the team can be found on their website, EquestriaGirls.com along with a little explanation about the situation. Below is a copy of the letter. Also for reference, here is a snapshot of the webpage via the Wayback machine, found here.

Dear (name removed):

We are counsel for Hasbro, Inc. and Hasbro Studios LLC (??Hasbro??), the owners of the copyrights and trademarks for the MY LITTLE PONY?? line of toy ponies and related cartoons, including the FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC?? animated television series. We write because we believe you provide hosting services for www.equestriagirls.com<http://www.equestriagirls.com>, which is a website that consists solely of unauthorized episodes of Hasbro??s FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC series. We would write directly to the site owner, however there is no contact information on the website, and the domain registration information is privacy protected. There is no non-infringing content on the equestriangirls.com website:

www.equestriagirls.com<http://www.equestriagirls.com>

Pursuant to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (??DMCA??) we have a good faith belief that the unauthorized copying, display and distribution of Hasbro??s MY LITTLE PONY: FRIENDSHIP IS MAGIC episodes on equestriagirls.com infringes Hasbro??s copyrights, trademarks and other intellectual property rights, and is not authorized by Hasbro, its agents, or the law. We are authorized to act on Hasbro??s behalf regarding these matters. The information provided in this communication is accurate to the best of my knowledge and is provided under penalty of perjury.

On behalf of Hasbro, we therefore request that you immediately remove or disable access to the www.equestriagirls.com<http://www.equestriagirls.com> website.

We would also appreciate it if you forwarded this correspondence to the website owner (we have copied the privacy protection service on this as well) so that we can start the process of transferring the domain name registration to Hasbro. ??Equestria Girls?? is the name of a MY LITTLE PONY promotional video and is widely and exclusively associated with Hasbro and Hasbro Studios.

Thank you for your cooperation in this matter. This letter does not purport to be a complete statement of the facts or the law and is without prejudice to Hasbro??s legal and equitable rights.
Sincerely yours,

(contact information removed)

To note Hasbro Inc registered Equestria Girls as a trademark earlier this year, with approval and ownership of the trademark being handed out just about a month ago on December 18th, 2012. You can see the registration here from the United States Patent & Trademark Office’s online website. It should also be pointed out that the above letter is more or less a form letter that we have seen multiple times during past C&D filings, as the owners of the site have pointed out they claim “unauthorized episodes” of Hasbro are posted on this site. While the video is not an actual episode, it is the property of Hasbro Inc and Hasbro Studio LLC.

So in general they are within their full right to remove the site, though it seems somewhat unneeded outside of the fact it contained a 30 second video. More disturbing is the fact they are taking control of the domain without any kind of compensation to the user. It would be understandable if the domain had been registered after the trademark, but as the wayback machine archive will show the website has been around since the start of the 2nd quarter of 2011.

Thanks to Starshine for the heads up on this.

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The Friendship is Witchcraft videos have been blocked on YouTube by Hasbro, even after a dispute. These are dark days for fan content.

And in other news Sherclop Pones announced earlier today via his Twitter (seen above) and Tumblr that the appeal on the Friendship is Witchcraft episodes which were tagged by Hasbro via the automated YouTube ContentID system has been denied. At this time we cannot confirm how the appealing system works, it is assumed that once an appeal is filed on ContentID flagged videos that it becomes the problem of the ContentID holder to review the content and either approve or deny the appeal. So we cannot confirm if it was Hasbro which has denied the appeal, or another automated system. The subject of YouTube’s ContentID and recent take downs was discussed earlier in the month. You can find that article here on DHN.

We’ve also been talking with Spectrum from The Midnight Run and some of our own people on who exactly can view the videos at this time. In general it seems that the video is blocked only to United States residents, meaning people in other countries such as Canada, the United Kingdom and Sweden can still view the videos. We’ve also noticed that when an appeal is filed against ContentID, it seems in general that the video becomes available to all people until a new decision is ruled upon. At this time we’ve found out that Germany is able to see all seven episodes, while only ep 2 and 7 can be seen by Canada.

It only affects viewers who appear to be in the United States. If you’re in another country, using a proxy server, or somehow got an IP that’s being incorrectly identified as being from a country other than the US, then they’ll still work without issue.

SuperGiantRobot

Hah. I’m Canadian. So I’ll get the new eppy. In yer face, Hazmat!

SuperGiantRobot

Try a proxy from a different country, maybe?

BK

I already have TOR set up on my machine so it takes me maybe an extra 30-60 seconds to get to it. The pointlessness of their actions just makes it worse that they bothered to do it. It’s as if they just felt like making someone angry.

Sellyme

And thus proceeds the flood of people who have absolutely no idea how copyright laws or YouTube’s ContentID system work.

^ This. We explained how this system works, its mostly automated, currently we are working with The Midnight Run to figure out how the appeals system work, since we don’t know if its Hasbro that makes the choice or someone at YouTube.

Hasbro is using the system to remove Seaosn 1 and Season 2 episodes for various reasons, namely the DVDs that are coming out, and being able to sell the broadcasting rights to other networks. They have to protect their interests. The fan made videos getting slapped around is nothing more than just a side effect.

Mjax

You have to admit the equestria girls thing was uncalled for, infact they gave no warning at all and as far as ive read they can legally commandeer the site but at the same time its kind of void due to the creation of the site being before their trademark

Do they ever consider to do something less jarring than a C&D?
Maybe a personal letter with the C&D attached so that they don’t scare people? :/

Azusa

Hey, Sherclop Pones, try posting your videos to Blip.tv

Kelazi5

I suspect Hasbro wanted the Equestria Girls website so they can have that url and use it for whatever they have planned for their Equestria Girls trademark. As for the friendship is witchcraft stuff abridged series that get that popular usually get booted from Youtube and have to get their own site. So, no need to panic yet.

Now, if they started going after EQD, DHN, fan animations, podcasts, and music then it’d be time to panic.

Anonymous

Pretty much this.

Anonymous

If I were the person who owned that Equestria Girls website, I’d be fighting it on principle. The website has been around for at least a year before the TM for “Equestria Girls” was handed to Hasbro. I’d take the Hub’s advert down to clear that issue away, and seek someone to help record a parody (of a parody) to fall under Fair Use; but I’d keep the website URL.

If you let some company barge in and take something because it shares the name of something they trademarked – even though the thing is older than the trademark! – it basically tells people they can get away with anything unethical as long as they get legal documents first.

Trademarks do not work backwards in time. Only from the point they were created and onwards. For that simple reason, I’d hold onto the URL and stand my ground.

BK

This is ironic, given that Equestria Girls itself is a work of parody itself. By this logic, the original song writer should be able to cease and desist Hasbro.

And Equestria Girls was not a parody, it was a derivative work. There’s a difference.

The whole point of Fair Use is to allow someone to make a commentary or criticism about the original work. Any parody covered under Fair Use, then, must be transformative, i.e. it must comment *on* the original work, not merely appropriate it. Since Equestria Girls had nothing to say about California Gurls, specifically, it’s not transformative and, hence, not a parody.

Fair Use defenses have been rejected precisely because an alleged parody was not transformative.

wait

what if this is some kind of trap.how can they know if this is actually Hasbro?

BK

Okay this is just stupid. This is enough to make me cease buying official Hasbro products.

For you guys who want to watch Friendship is Witchcraft, we talked with Sherclop last night and gained permission to host FiW on our own video service. It not as fancy as YouTube, but hey, it is something.